Court stays transparency panel’s order on school data

NEW DELHI - The Delhi High Court has stayed a Central Information Commission (CIC) order directing the Delhi government to make public the admission criteria for poor children followed by private schools in the last three years.

The court also stayed the CIC order to put on the government website details about the annual income tax returns placed on record by the schools.

Justice S. Muralidhar stayed till April 7 the directions passed by the CIC on an application for information under the right to information (RTI) act.

The court order came Jan 6 on an appeal filed by a group of private schools - The Delhi State Public School Management Association - challenging the CIC’s order passed Dec 12 last year.

The association of schools submitted that the schools’ annual returns were confidential documents and should not be made public.

In December last year, the CIC directed the Delhi government to ensure that all schools put up a display board carrying information about available seats for students from the economically weaker section (EWS).

Acting on an application filed by a woman under RTI law, the commission directed the directorate of education that the display boards in schools should be in English and Hindi.

It said the display boards should show total number of seats in all classes in a school, total vacancies in all classes, total number of seats under the EWS quota, seats available under the quota, total applications received under the quota, information about till when the EWS quota applications will be received and the date by which the admissions will be given.

The directorate was also asked by the commission to put on its website annual returns filed till date by private schools along with a list of schools which had defaulted in filing the returns.